


Static

by sunlight



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Mutual Pining, Recreational Drug Use, Theft of the Author, Touch-Starved Sirius Black, hypermasculinity, sports written by someone who doesn't play sports
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-01
Updated: 2020-04-01
Packaged: 2021-02-28 17:29:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23330932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunlight/pseuds/sunlight
Summary: “You construct intricate rituals which allow you to touch the skin of other men.”So do wizards.A [loose] 5+1.
Relationships: Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
Comments: 7
Kudos: 57





	Static

It’s another classic Friday evening with the Marauders; they should be partying, living it up as the top dogs of Hogwarts, but instead they’re sitting sprawled across two tables with homework, cramming to finish it now so they can have the rest of the weekend free. It’s something new they’re trying this year. 

Sirius hates it. Well, he hates it on Friday nights, while they’re doing the work, but having an empty Saturday and Sunday has been quite nice these past few weeks. Maybe Remus is onto something with the idea. Might as well get on with his next assigned reading; his eyelids are going to start shutting if he doesn’t distract himself.

“Moony, hand me that book, please?” Sirius flutters his eyelashes to accompany the question, trying to sweeten the deal. Sirius will do his homework on a Friday night but he’s not going to stand up and walk all the way to the other end of the table just to grab a textbook. He has never put in that much effort for school and isn’t going to start now.

“You’ll have to be more specific.” Remus responds, not taking his eyes off of the parchment in front of him. He’s been writing furiously for the last hour or so, only pausing occasionally to stretch his wrist or grab a drink of water. 

“The one that’s purple out of the corner of your eye but it’s green if you look directly at it? It’s—”

Before Sirius finishes the description, the book appears in front of his face, held by Remus, who’s still hard at work on his essay. Always anticipating people’s needs, even when he’s hard at work. 

Sirius reaches up to grab the book, and his fingers lightly brush around Remus’s fingers. A jolt of something—magic, maybe—rushes up his arm to his spine. He startles and pulls his hands away from the book—and Remus’s fingers—at once. This book hasn’t been known to shock its readers before, but it has been a while since he’s cracked it open, perhaps it’s upset with him at being ignored? 

Not wanting Remus to think he was startled by the brush of their skin, he returns his hands to the book. He wraps his palms around the corners, making sure not to touch Remus again. Nothing happens. Sirius looks up to smile at Remus, and is met with a puzzled look. 

“The book, it—” Sirius stops, knowing how silly he’d sound to accuse the book of giving him a magical shock. “Never mind.” Sirius shakes his head at himself, and lowers the book to his lap, opening it up to their assigned chapters. 

He fully intends to read, really. It’s just that he finds that he can’t focus on the words on the page; his attention keeps being drawn to a canoodling couple over on a plush armchair near the fireplace. They’ve been mostly quiet, displaying appropriate levels of affection given the semi-public nature of the common room, but as more students retire to the dorms for the evening, they’ve gotten closer. Not even snogging, just sitting together clearly enjoying each other’s company. 

Normally Sirius wouldn’t even look twice at something like this, or if he did it’d just be to point them out to James so that he can tease them. But something about them holds him back. They look so comfortable, warm by the fire. Maybe once they leave, Sirius will take the seat to finish working on his homework. It looks cozy. 

Sirius stretches out his neck and turns, making eye contact with James across the table. James sits, face completely neutral, arms crossed, boring his eyes into Sirius, sending the clear message that he has been watching for some time now. 

“What do you want?” Sirius asks, accusation ripe in his voice.

“Nothing!” James puts his hands up in front of his chest. “Honestly, nothing,” but the coy smile he gives Sirius doesn’t convince him. Neither does the way he crosses his arms and continues to stare.

“Sure...” Sirius mumbles. 

He looks back down, but still can’t force himself to read. The words on the pages in front of him blur as his mind drifts. 

His gaze drifts up again, over Remus’s shoulder to the couple on the armchair again. They’re both relatively unpopular fifth years, so Sirius isn’t sure of their names, and the girl is from another house. They make quite a handsome pair, the two. Wavy tawny hair on the tall skinny boy contrasts with the dark curls that adorn the Hufflepuff girl. It’s sweet.

Perhaps all couples should have opposite, complimentary hair. Just for the aesthetic. James certainly hits the mark with his thing for Evans, and Peter’s dirty blonde certainly is opposite the muddy brown of Dorcas’s brunette locks.

“ _Moony?_ Interested in a _sport_ _‽_ _”_ James’s booming voice brings Sirius out of his matchmaking thoughts. “Boys, we’ve got to take advantage of this while it lasts!” James hops up from his chair and starts motioning that they should go outside—and that they should go now. He keeps up a steady stream of a chant of “Footie, footie, footie!,” cluing Sirius into the topic of conversation. 

“James,” Remus’s voice is colored with a laugh. “It’s nearly midnight, I promise I’ll still want to play tomorrow.” 

Midnight? Had he really been dreaming that long? Did he fall asleep at the table?

“What got you so interested in—” Sirius stumbles in his attempt at a smooth re-entrance to the conversation. “Footsie?” 

Peter snorts. James tries unsuccessfully to cover a deep laugh, and Remus…Remus just looks downward avoiding Sirius’s eyes. 

“Eh, Moony?” Sirius prods after a few moments with no response.

“I…Tim? My friend, that is, he played in a competitive football league, I watched a few of his games last summer.” Remus’s voice is almost a mumble. “We played together—casually—” Remus says, almost defensive. “Just a few times.”

Sirius glances at James and Peter, who are both watching Sirius, like the information from Remus isn’t new to them. Like they’ve heard this name before.

Something hot in the pit of his stomach starts boiling. Anger? There’s nothing for him to be mad about...Is he jealous? Jealous that Remus would watch a different sport when he rarely attended Quidditch matches? Yeah, that must be it. 

The feeling flares deep inside of him. He knows it’s irrational, but he has to stop himself from snapping at Remus. He needs to leave before he says something he regrets.

“Alright,” Sirius slaps his thighs as he stands up. “If we’re playing in the morning, lads, I’m going to get some sleep now.” He doesn’t fully manage to keep the biting anger out of his voice, and he figures, well, in for a knut, in for a galleon. He attempts to meet Remus’s eyes—tries to give him some sort of disappointed look, make him feel worse—but finds Remus looking resolutely down at his parchment. 

Sirius just turns on his heel and bounds up to their dorm. Once inside, he shucks off his clothes, not bothering to change into pajamas, opting to slide under his covers wearing nothing but underpants. He charms the curtains closed tightly and lays down on his back, staring up at the draped fabric. 

His mire had faded some on the short journey to his bed from the common room, but he finds his head clouded with confusion instead. Nothing to make you feel foolish like storming away from your best friends for no good reason. 

Why did Peter and James seem to know about Tim already? Why would Remus not mention a new friend to Sirius? He hadn’t, Sirius is certain. Not once in any of his letters over the summer, not once in the few weeks they’ve been back at Hogwarts.

Out of nowhere Sirius’s skin is alight like fire ants are crawling all over him. His upper arms and thighs and shins itch. Even the soles of both feet burn. He rips the covers off to find that—of course—it’s just his imagination. No insects in these sheets, just skin that won’t calm down and a stomach ache that feels like his guts have fallen off the edge of the castle but the rest of his body is still at the top. 

Is it possible that Remus _had_ mentioned Tim? That Sirius just hasn’t been paying attention as well as he thought? Maybe he’s been tuning Remus out while he’s sharing important information. 

Regardless, the way he treated Remus downstairs was embarrassing. Letting petty feelings take control without thinking is exactly what got him into this prickly situation with Remus last year. Since last year, the prank that really wasn’t a prank, Sirius knows he’s been on thin ice with Remus. He owes Remus an apology for letting his anger get the best of himself. Well, he’s probably got more than one overdue apology to Remus for that.

Sirius turns over onto his side and pulls the blanket up over his head. It’s childish, but sometimes the hiding helps him calm down. His breath makes the air dense, and soon he’s drifting off into sleep, still beneath the comforter. 

\--

“Psst—” A hand shaking Sirius’s shoulder rouses him from his fitful sleep. 

Sirius rubs the sleep out of his eyes and when he opens them, Remus is standing above him.

“What time’sit?” Sirius grumbles.

“Just past three.” Remus holds out a tightly rolled joint. “Astronomy classes are done for the night, want to go upstairs?”

That’s all it takes to convince Sirius to get out of bed without all of his beauty sleep, and he throws his legs off the side and stands up, enthusiasm driving him more than any energy. He pulls on a loose-fitting robe that will keep him warm enough in the windy astronomy tower. 

The walk upstairs is silent, and Sirius knows it’s only somewhat about the need for stealth. When it’s just the two of them alone together, it’s like this more often than not. They don’t joke around in the same ways anymore, don’t tease each other and rarely touch. 

An apology for earlier is on the tip of his tongue, but he bites it back. Remus inviting him upstairs is enough of an olive branch that he won’t risk ruining the mood by bringing up his rude behavior. 

They settle into their usual spots, backs pressed against a wall not too far from the edge, but far enough out of the path of the bitter wind that whips around the tower. 

It’s a comfortable quietude, sitting with his best mate again, letting loose. The stresses and pressures of the new term have yet to set in on them, and Sirius tries to revel in the feeling. They’ve come a long way since last year. They’d begun making these trips up to the Astronomy tower, a sort of way to comfortably co-exist while Remus was still so upset with Sirius that he didn’t want to talk about anything. It was something they could do together, even if they couldn’t talk.

Remus holds his wand up in front of him and with a wordless spell, lights the tip of the joint. It’s beautiful, the practiced way that his hands grasp the conical joint, his wand, how he elegantly puffs on the joint to get it going. 

“Here,” Remus breathes out, passing it to Sirius. 

Sirius grabs it, carefully, but not carefully enough; their fingers brush for a moment. The same shock from earlier rockets up Sirius’s fingers, hand, arm and spine again. He realizes what this means: it wasn’t the book, it was Remus. He’s able to keep himself from pulling his hand back in shock, and is pretty sure Remus didn’t notice anything weird, thank goodness. Recoiling twice in one day for no reason when you touch your friend would really be bad.

Maybe there’s something about being a werewolf makes you hold a lot of extra static ekeltricity? Sirius doesn’t want to ask, lest he offend Remus. He’ll do some research on his own time. 

It could be the brisk air that has Sirius wanting to scoot closer to Remus, or maybe it’s just the excitement at spending time alone together again. Either way, he resists the urge—their only point of contact is the occasional brush of fingers as they continue to pass the joint back and forth, not speaking. The shock comes each time, but since Sirius can anticipate it, it doesn’t catch him off guard. It’s sort of nice.

The joint gets smaller, so there’s more hands on involvement to make sure no one’s skin is in danger of touching the burning end as he gives it back to Remus. The sensation dances up Sirius’s forearm. 

"Have you ever shotgunned before?" Remus asks, catching him off guard. Sirius had expected this to be a quiet night.

"What, like a rifle?" 

"No, you—it's like, you take a hit," Remus brings the joint to his lips and inhales. "And then—" he exhales, pink cheeks puffing up comically as he demonstrates "—you blow it right into someone's mouth, and they inhale it too."

"Oh." Sirius imagines doing that with Remus. He gulps; the thought of their faces— _lips_ —being that close together makes his neck feel warm. “Um. Have you?” 

“Yeah, I… last summer.” It’s hard to tell in the dark hour, but Remus’s face seems to color a darker red with his admission. He flicks ash from the end of the joint, pointedly avoiding Sirius’s eye contact.

Remus doesn’t offer any more information, and Sirius doesn’t dare ask. He wonders, but he doesn’t ask.

For a while, the only sound is the wind whipping around the curved walls of the castle. Sirius tries to build up the confidence to suggest they try it—the shotgunning—but he's too late. 

“Last hit?” Remus offers it to Sirius, but he just shakes his head no. After one final, long drag, Remus flicks the butt over the side of the castle. 

“You litter-er!” Sirius teases, poking a finger into Remus’s side. He knows the paper and filter are biodegradable, but it’s nice to have an excuse to invade Remus’s personal space.

Remus, laughing, pulls himself away and stands up. “C’mon, Pads. Let’s head back.” Remus stretches out his arm, offering a hand up to Sirius. 

He feels hazy, a fresh buzz from the joint washing over his limbs. He reaches up for the hand Remus offered and tugs on it. The shock doesn’t come, just a warm sensation where they touch. “Moony, just a few minutes, please?” He whines. “I don’t want to lose my high by walking down all those stairs just yet.”

Remus rolls his eyes but slides back to the floor—closer now, so that their shoulders are pressing against each other. Still holding hands. Sirius feels like he needs to address it. To address something. Maybe the apology for overreacting about Tim, finally.

“Sure is…cold,” he says, and immediately winces at himself. _Obviously_ Remus knows it’s cold, he’s got thermoreceptors just like anyone else 

Remus turns his head to face Sirius, a one sided smile pulling his lips, but says nothing in response. _Certainly_ they’ve been this close together in the past and _certainly_ it didn’t cause Sirius’s heartbeat to quicken. So what the hell?

He chalks it up to the weed, even though it’s never quite felt like this.

\--

“You’ve slept long enough,” James pulls the blanket off of Sirius, who lets out a sound of protest in response. “It’s time to do Muggle Sports!”

“What the bloody fuck, James!” Sirius has half a mind to hex James for such a rude wake up call. It’s not like he got a lot of great sleep after he and Remus came back last night. Early this morning. 

Sirius rips the blanket out of James’s hands and re-covers his mostly nude body. Not that they hadn’t seen each other’s...everything before, it’s just gosh darn cold in the morning!

“He’s been trying to wake you for a while now, Sirius,” Remus’s voice catches him off guard—he didn’t look past the other empty beds and assumed the room was empty save for him and James. Remus is standing in the doorway. And he’s in Muggle clothes.

And his ankles are bare.

Sirius is at once aware of his stiffy—and boy is it Stiff. He’s got to get rid of Remus so he can walk to the bathroom without shame. And, James too, he supposes. But that’s not as pressing, for some reason.

Sirius can’t rip his eyes away from Remus’s bare ankles. His bare shins, knees, a bit of his thigh. What the actual hell is going on? The pair of shorts he’s wearing are brightly colored, a red he’s never seen on Remus before, with a white stripe down the side that also rims the bottom hem. And the hem is shorter than anything he’d seen on him before. On anyone, for that matter.

There are the old scars fading on his legs, of course. But Remus seems to wear them with a new confidence that wasn’t there before. 

“Alright, uh,” Sirius coughs to clear his throat. “Go downstairs, I’ll meet you in a few.” He doesn’t move from the bed, only pulls the blanket a little tighter around himself.

“No way, mate, if I don’t see you stand up how do I know you’re out of bed?” James rebuts. He gives Sirius a Look.

“Fine, fine!” Sirius glances over to the doorway where Remus is still leaning, a matching Look on his face. “It’s like you don’t trust me to wake up or something!”

“Exactly!” Remus adds, ribbing at him. “Now c’mon, I want to school you all in something physical for once in my life.” He turns to leave.

James gives Sirius an exaggerated wink as Remus bounds down the stairs to the common room. “You’ve got five minutes, Pads,” James turns and walks toward the door to follow Remus downstairs. “Don’t think I won’t be back with a vengeance.”

When the room is finally, _blessedly_ empty, Sirius can get out of bed. Armed with a set of James’s Quidditch practice robes, which are decidedly more Muggle than anything Sirius owns, he runs to the bathroom to deal with... well. To deal with everything. He only has five minutes, after all.

He rushes through his morning routine, but finds that the robes—which really are more of a long sleeve shirt/vest/shorts/leggings combination situation—take him a good portion of his five minutes to figure out how to put on.

Sirius continues to fret over the clothes the whole way downstairs and outside, tugging the sleeves and vest and adjusting the hems magically. He knows it’s just redirected anxiety from how he’s feeling about Remus. 

When they’re nearly to the Quidditch pitch, Remus and Peter walking ahead of James and Sirius, he can’t hold it any longer.

“Who is this Muggle Remus learned about this all from?” Sirius asks, voice low even though he’s certain the others are out of earshot. 

“Oh, Tim?” Sirius nods. “Did Remus really not…” James’s sentence drifts off, and there’s a look on his face like he’s just figured something out before he continues, barreling over the pause like it never happened. “Um! Yeah, Remus mentioned him a few times over the summer, he’s the…son of Hope’s co-worker? Or something, I’m not sure exactly. Guess they hung out a lot.” 

“I don’t understand,” Sirius says, voice small. “Did he mention Tim and I just...wasn’t paying attention?”

“No, Sirius, I don’t think that’s—”

“God, I’m a terrible friend, I can’t even listen when he’s talking to me, I thought that—I thought—” 

James reaches a hand out and stops Sirius, steadying him. They stand still on the path. 

“James, I thought I had gotten better,” Sirius says. The despair is setting in. Truly, he thought that he had become less self-centered, able to pay attention to people other than himself. Obviously he’s not _fixed_ , he’s not ever going to be completely fixed, he’ll probably always be a narcissistic asshole and he knows that, but at least he thought he had improved. 

“Sirius,” James says, and Sirius looks up to meet his eyes. “Stop. I think…there’s another reason.” It’s almost as if he’s walking on tiptoes with his words. “A reason he didn’t tell _you_ …but told me and Pete.”

“Wait, so he didn’t tell me?” Maybe Sirius _isn’t_ such a bad friend after all! He pumps his fist at his side. It’s not that Sirius wasn’t paying attention to what Remus was saying, because there was nothing for him to miss! 

“Sirius—”

He stops in his tracks, realizing what this means. The boys knew about Tim, but Sirius was kept intentionally in the dark. Fuck. 

“Fuck,” Sirius says aloud. “Fuck.” Sirius’s mind runs a thousand miles a minute. “That’s okay, I get it, I understand, I totally, I was such a bad—I just—he obviously didn’t forgive me, that’s ok—I wouldn’t forgive me!—I’m okay—I’m just going to go back inside—” Sirius turns and starts to head back toward the castle. 

James grabs his wrist, pulling him close. “Sirius. Trust me. Talk to Remus.” With that, he lets go, and skips to catch up with the other boys. 

That’s…not what they do, him and Remus. Not anymore. Talk. Now they sit together in silence, passing joints back and forth, and it’s _fine._ They exchange platitudes, and that’s better than anything he could ever have hoped for. The times where he wants to talk, the words get stuck inside of him. He wants to tell Remus so much. 

James struts over toward the quidditch shed, holding his wand up so the locking ward will disable—doing so by recognizing a “Team Captain’s Magical Signature,” as James had bragged to them— _explained to them_ —after his Quidditch Captain Orientation. 

“Will this work?” James holds up a quaffle to Remus. “To transfigure?” 

“Yeah, toss it here.” Remus catches it without hesitating. Where did this hand-eye coordination come from all of a sudden? 

Did _Tim_ teach him _?_

Remus points his wand at the quaffle, and after a moment, a familiar ball takes form in his grasp. 

“Oh!” Sirius says, delighted. “We’re playing soccer? Why didn’t you just say!” 

“Wait—” Remus looks to Sirius, and then to James and Peter, who are both nodding, grins on their faces. “I thought…”

“Soccer is big in some Wizarding communities,” James explains. Remus’s face falls in response. Clearly, Remus was excited to introduce them all to something new. “But let’s play the Muggle version, I’m sure it’s different! Moony?” 

The rules are explained and goals are transfigured from a few rows of the bandstand seating that circles the pitch. Without the use of magic, the game will be different than Sirius is used to, but he still expects it to be a good amount of fun.

“Alright Pete, you’re with me.” James jogs past him with a slap on the rear. 

“What the—James!” Peter wails, turning on his heel to go after him. “What was that!”

“It’s what the Muggles do when they play sports!” James yells back. “Right, Remus?” 

Remus’s eyes go big and he turns and brusquely walks toward the goal on their side, not acknowledging James. 

Sirius is rooted in his spot, turning his head back and forth to look at Remus and the other boys. 

“You coming?” Remus doesn’t turn around to verify, he must be able to tell Sirius hasn’t moved.

Sirius jogs after Remus, vowing to shake off any of this weird feeling that’s been clouding his mind. 

“You want to play offense or defense?” Remus greets Sirius with, once Sirius is close enough to be heard without Remus raising his voice.

“Oh, I’m pretty versatile,” Sirius says. Part of the reason he had never tried out for the Quidditch team was that he couldn’t pick a position that he liked best. “I can go both ways, I like them both for different reasons, you know?” 

Remus’s face colors, though it’s probably from the biting wind that plagues the castle grounds this time of the year. 

“Okay, you play goalie,” Remus “We can switch at some point if you want, but I prefer to be the one doing the kicking, not the catching.” 

Remus meets James at the center of the pitch. They play a game of Stone, Parchment, Wand to decide who starts with the ball. They chant: “Stone, Parchment! Wand!” and Sirius doesn’t see what they each throw down, because he can’t take his eyes off of Remus’s legs. They are so long and his red shorts are so short.

There’s a blur in his peripheral vision and it takes him a second too long to tear his eyes away from ankles, calveskneesthingsmuscle—to react in time, and he dives to the wrong side of the goal, trying to anticipate the ball’s locale. James scores on him, easily. 

James and Peter exchange whoops across the pitch, while Remus just sends him a quirked eyebrow. Sirius knows he’s asking _Are you okay?_ Remus has a keen sense when something is off with any of the three of them, and is eager to be a metaphorical or literal shoulder to lean on as need be. 

Or maybe he noticed Sirius staring. 

When Sirius finally meets Remus’s gaze, his eyebrow has turned to a concerned wrinkle. 

The ball whizzes over to Remus’s feet, and James is calling them all back into place. Sirius can’t tell if he’s relieved or if he’s disappointed that Remus didn’t say anything. 

Peter waits for James to return to their side before he goes back to the goal, and he gives James’s rear a slap, presumably in congratulations for the point he scored. 

Remus will definitely score too.

The game picks up after that; James and Remus vie for the ball, pushing each other out of the way in maneuvers involving elbows that are definitely against the rules. Sirius even gets his feet on the ball a few times, and he’s able to pass it to Remus each time, successfully defending their goal. 

Peter is surprisingly good at defense, and manages to block Remus’s attempts on the goal one after another. Neither team scores for a while, but it’s almost more fun with all of them constantly running and shouting, pushing and scraping by each other. James is awful handsy with Remus, who’s returning it in spades. 

Remus dribbles the ball (without needing to watch his feet!) over toward Peter, and does something with it that Sirius can’t exactly follow, and neither can Peter. Remus kicks the ball high into the opposite corner of the goal that Peter dives to defend. They’ve got a point! It’s a comical mirror of what had happened to Sirius earlier, except Peter had nothing distracting him; Remus is just _good_ at playing soccer. Huh.

Sirius whoops and skips out to meet Remus, blood pounding in his head as he skids to a stop in front of him. He can see James over Remus’s shoulder, watching them intently. Is this where he slaps Remus’s butt? In congratulations? In friendly, brotherly, camaraderie?

They’re facing each other. Does Sirius reach around to slap it? Does he walk around to the other side? Wait until Remus turns around?

In his hesitation his hands come up in front of him almost subconsciously. When he realizes what he’s doing he accompanies it quickly with a “Double high fives!! Remus! Great job!” That Remus indulges him in, a fond quirk of a smile on his lips. 

Their hands stay pressed together for a second, and the palms of Remus’s hands are so, so soft. Softer than Sirius would expect for another teenage boy. Sirius stares intently at their hands as their fingers begin to slot themselves together, just barely curling toward a grasp. There’s no static shock, just warmth. 

“We can keep playing any day now, boys,” James yells over, startling them apart. 

Sirius offers Remus a sheepish smile and a “Nice goal, Moony,” before he tosses a scrunched-up tongue-out face to James as he jogs back to his position near the goal. 

Someone is looking down and smiling on them today, because it’s a rare sunny day. Even though it’s late in the season, the weather dashing toward Autumn, the beams of the sun are still warm enough to bring beads of sweat to their skin. 

A thick drip of sweat releases from the back of Sirius’s hairline, and he feels it follow his spine all the way down to his elastic waistband in the loose clothes he’s wearing. More drops are threatening to do the same all the way around his head. It is a decidedly Unsexy feeling. 

Down on the other side of the pitch is Remus, and the sweat stains on his armpits are well-deserved after the amount of running he’s been doing. Remus reaches up to wipe his forehead and a small rainshower of sweat comes sliding off. Remus doesn’t break his pace at all, and wow. Sirius is learning a lot from Remus about how to make sweat sexy. 

This game really is turning into Peter and James versus Remus while Sirius spectates. But it’s a pretty evenly matched game between the three of them. For once Sirius is the loose cog in the wheel. Which… is fine, strangely. Watching Remus enjoying himself, showing it so plainly with loose body language and a bright smile, it makes Sirius feel tight in his chest. But in a good way, which is new. 

Peter kicks the ball out of the field, into the stands, somehow, and James runs after it. The other two seem to agree it’s time to take a brief pause, and Sirius sits down in the goal while Peter and Remus catch their breath. 

When James returns with the ball shortly after they all move toward the middle to reconvene. 

“Whaddya say, boys, next goal wins?” James says, which is odd. Normally he’d push them to keep playing, all _Best two out of three okay three out of five please! Please! Four out of seven I swear it’s the last time!_ If there’s any chance that he might not come out victorious in a competition of any type. The ball has spent most of its time on their half of the field, but James seems awfully okay with the idea that he might not win this match. “We can stop by the locker room and shower quick, then by the kitchens, and then the whole world is our oyster!” He pants as he says this, though, giving away his exhaustion. 

Shortly after they get started up again, Remus does a diversion tactic that involves a 180 turn and running backwards and sideways for a moment. He passes around James easily, hardly even looking down at the ball. 

The wind up for the kick is unexpected—Remus is in the middle of his stride, not looking toward the goal at all. The ball soars through the air, hits the goalpost on one side, and then angles right into the back of the net, soaring right past a dumbstruck Peter. 

Because of the way he contorted his legs and hips for the shot, Remus falls down in a heap as soon as his foot ceases contact with the ball. Sirius sees the whole thing happen from his goal, which he finds himself suddenly twenty paces in front of. 

Peter and James reach first, and they each grab one of Remus’s arms and pull him up to standing. Not that they both need to, Remus looks perfectly capable of standing right now. Remus looks great, honestly, if a little disheveled and very sweaty. 

There’s mud of different levels of dry-ness all up and down Remus’s legs, and much of his clothes are splattered as well. Sirius hadn’t realized how wet the field must have been from the recent rain. 

Peter is the first to slap Remus’s bum, with a “Good fuckin’ game, lad! That last one was brill.” 

Sirius makes eye contact with James, who then also slaps Remus’s bum, and makes a very pointed _go ahead_ motion at Sirius, like they’re all expecting him to do this and if he doesn’t it’s weird, and maybe it’s weird that he didn’t do it earlier.

Before Sirius can second guess himself he reaches out, cocks his left elbow back. In his nervousness, he misjudges the angle, landing too low on Remus’s arse. His fingers wrap under Remus’s buttcheek in what can only be described as a scoop. Worse: his pinky finger has somehow hooked under the hem of Remus’s shorts, touching just the slightest amount of soft, smooth skin. 

In Fight or Flight situations, Sirius likes to think he packs a mean punch, but usually he ends up Freezing instead. It’s exactly what he does here; keeps his hand on Remus a few seconds too long. A noise startles Sirius into snatching his hand back, and he’s almost certain he scratches Remus with his fingernail. 

When they make eye contact after Sirius pulls away, Remus doesn’t seem upset by the scoop at all! He’s got a teeth-baring grin on his face, pupils huge. Probably because he’s glad they won. Well, Remus did all the work, so he’s probably proud he won _for_ them. 

Probably Remus is used to having his bum smacked from playing soccer all summer with _Tim_ so getting his bum scooped on accident is normal at this point. Maybe having it scooped on purpose is normal too. The two are unrelated. Probably.

Sirius could almost convince himself nothing weird happened at all, if only James weren’t standing there with a conniving look. Probably just glad to see him getting along so well with Remus after being anxious about their friendship earlier. He’s always been the glue keeping the four connected, always feels responsible for solving disputes. 

“Well, we all stink. Let’s go clean up, boys!” James turns toward the building that houses the shower and changing rooms and gestures for them to follow. 

They all stumble into the locker room in various states of needing-a-shower. Remus, by far the muddiest, beelines for the stall closest to the wall and shuts the door without looking back. 

Peter and James are ahead of Sirius, so by process of elimination, Sirius goes into the remaining stall in the row between Remus and James. No reason to go all the way to another bay of showers just because he was accidentally handsy with his mate. 

Sirius peels of his dirty clothes in the vestibule, his muscles groaning as he bends over. He didn’t play much, but he _did_ still do a bit of running. He reaches past the curtain and turns the shower on to the highest heat setting. He waits as it heats up before he subjects his whole body to freezing cold (rumored-to-be lake) water and waits a moment, testing the stream before he steps inside the cubicle.

Sirius stands in the shower facing away from the stream because he’s not a monster. Someone—Peter—is humming, and the sound prompts Sirius to close his eyes and see what else he can hear.

There’s the water, of course. Four streams at slightly different intensities hitting the bodies of his three best friends in the universe and himself at different angles and speeds and temperatures. It’s soothing. He forces himself to listen past it. 

There’s skin slapping and rubbing, nothing scandalous, just the sounds of bodies being cleaned. There’s the gentle pop of soap bubbles in someone’s hair nearby. 

A sigh catches his attention, and he’s sure that he wouldn’t have heard it if he hadn’t already been tuned into the audioscape of the room. His eyes shoot open, and without his permission his gaze goes to the two inch crack at the bottom of the stall door. He can’t see any of Remus, just the hint of a shadow moving as he washes. 

Sirius wonders what the shower situation was like when Remus and Tim played, how much of Remus he could see through the crack under the stall? Or...mMaybe there was no stall.

Sirius presses his hand against the wall his shower shares with Remus. For a second he imagines Remus doing the same on the other side.

\--

“Show me once again, Sirius?” 

Sirius is helping Remus. Yes. _Sirius_ is helping _Remus._ With homework—well okay, it’s sort of an extra-curricular, but still. Sirius is the one helping. 

They’re in Hogsmeade while the temporary ban is lifted from Apparation to allow them to practice. Sirius is excellent, doesn’t need the extra time before they take their test. Remus, though—

“Sirius?” Remus repeats. “I’m just not getting it.”

“Which D are you getting stuck on?” Sirius asks, getting back to the task at hand. “Destination? Determination—” 

“No, Sirius, I can clearly see where I’m trying to go—” Remus gestures to the other hoop laid out on the ground, about ten feet away. He seems a bit flustered, face tinted red. “It’s not as if I’m trying to go all the way to the other end of Hogsmeade!” Remus takes a deep breath and closes his eyes, turning away from Sirius just the slightest bit. “Truth is...I think I’m hesitating, not letting myself because I... don’t like how it feels?”

“Oh, the squeezing?” It had caught Sirius off guard his first few times too.

“No, it’s—it’s how alone I am.” Remus opens his eyes and looks directly at Sirius. “I know it doesn’t even last a full second, but it reminds me so much of...it’s like—” His voice chokes off. 

“It’s like Fulls?” 

Remus nods, breaking their eye contact and looking away once again. “Yeah, like, the last moment I’m really aware of before everything goes away; it’s the same feeling when I apparate.” 

“That makes sense,” Sirius says, cautiously. He could very easily say the wrong thing here, and he doesn’t want to misstep. Now that he thinks on it, the feeling of shifting into Padfoot _is_ similar to how Apparation feels. An out of body experience. But it’s so different, because becoming Padfoot is always a good thing, and Remus becoming the Wolf...is not. 

“Should we…” Sirius says, not sure exactly where the sentence is going. “Oh!” An idea comes to him. “Do you want me to Side-Along you a couple times? Just to practice? To get used to what it’s like?”

Remus looks surprised, like the idea hadn’t occurred to him. “I think that...could be good.” He starts to nod, slowly, but it picks up speed as he talks. “Yeah, definitely. If I pick out enough things that make it feel different, unique, while I know I’m not alone,” Remus reaches out and grabs onto Sirius’s proffered arm, wrapping his fingers tentatively. “Then it won’t feel so lonely later, on my own.” 

They’re standing, just looking at each other, and it’s like the rest of the hustle and bustle of the village has faded out around them. It’s just Remus and Sirius. No Tim, because he’s a Muggle and can’t apparate because he’s not cool like they are. Sirius and Remus. Not lonely but alone, together.

“Wait, better idea!” Sirius says, taking Remus’s hand off of his arm. Before he can lose this sudden burst of confidence, he puts his left arm around Remus’s shoulder and squeezes him in close. Remus brings an arm up around Sirius’s lower back, tucking around his side like it belongs there. They grab each others’ wrists with their free arms. 

“Ready?” Sirius asks. 

Remus nods, and they’re off.

“Holy—” Remus’s knees give out as soon as they set down in the other hoop. 

“Remus, fuck!” Sirius helps Remus to the ground, into a comfortable sitting position, not breaking their contact. “Are you okay?” 

Remus looks up at Sirius, a slight grimace on his face, but a slightly hysterical laugh breaks the silence and then they’re both sitting on the grass, cracking up, arms loosely around each other.

Sirius tries to catch his breath and come back to the present, but every time he looks at Remus’s face he starts laughing again. After a few minutes, they naturally come to stop, both breathing heavily and smiling. 

“Well, let’s go again!” Remus gestures toward the original hoop. “Take me back!”

Since they’re still touching, Sirius decides they don’t have to stand up, they can just apparate like this. 

They find themselves in a pile of limbs, back in the first hoop. Sirius can’t see Remus’s face, and he holds his breath, worried.

But then, Remus starts to laugh again, and the worry evaporates. 

“That was—” Remus can’t stop laughing to get a full sentence out. He starts it several more times before giving up and pausing to catch his breath. 

“That was better—easier—than it’s ever been.” 

Sirius feels a joyous bubble deep inside him. He’s done it! He helped! 

“I’m going to try on my own now, okay?” Remus moves out from under Sirius’s arm, lets go of his wrist. 

Sirius stays on the ground, but crawls out of the hoop, letting Remus take his spot in the middle like he’s center stage, and this is his soliloquy. He takes a deep breath, which Sirius mirrors. Another. 

And with a crack, Remus is in the other hoop!

They both let out a yelp in excitement. Remus has done it! 

Sirius hops to his feet and runs over, whooping, shouting prideful nonsense. Before he has a chance to think it over, he’s scooping Remus up in a bridal carry. 

“Lads!” Sirius jogs over toward Madam Puddifoot’s, where Peter and James have been waiting for them, watching their practice from a patio seat. Well, they were supposed to have been watching. “Lads, you missed it!” Remus is still laughing as Sirius sets him down in an empty chair at the table. “Remus did it! 

“Heyo!!! We’re all going to be licensed after all!” James shouts. “Sit, Sirius! Sit down, sit sit sit! Tell us everything! Pete, go grab a round from the barkeep, yeah?” James slaps a hand on Peter’s shoulder, who gets up and leaves without acknowledgment. Sourpuss. 

Sirius settles in to recount the story ten times more fanciful than it had been. Leave out the conversation about the Wolf. Yeah. Skip the hard parts, embellish the truth, and make Remus look good. 

It’s never been hard for Sirius, making Remus look good.

\--

Sirius is bored. He’s tried everything. Homework. Chess, playing both sides. He’s even tried reading a book _for fun._ James is serving a detention for something Sirius had also been involved in but managed to avoid being caught. Peter...who knows what Peter’s up to, but he’s not here in the dorm with them.

“Psst! Remus!” He whispers. “I’m booored.”

Remus doesn’t respond, but Sirius knows that he heard him. 

Sirius crawls around in his bed until his head is at the feet end and he’s laying on his stomach, facing Remus. 

“Remus!” He tries again. “What are you doing?” 

Remus’s eyebrow twitches. 

“C’mon, Moons!”

“What does it look like I’m doing?” Remus asks. It is very much not a question.

“Well it looks like you’re ignoring me,” Sirius sniffs, putting on a fake crying voice, “in favor of—of—homework!” He’s pretty sure it’s not homework, Remus has been guarding the cover of the book like it’s something he doesn’t want anyone else to see. 

“Sirius, this isn’t homework,” Remus says, shutting the book, but keeping a finger in place, making it clear that this pause is only temporary. “I’ve told you, it’s just something I brought—”

Sirius hops off of his bed and jaunts over to Remus’s bed, snagging the book from his hands before he can finish the sentence. 

“Alright…” He takes a peek at the cover, “Maurice! Show me what you’ve got.” Sirius flips it open on the page Remus had been holding, and finds the margins lined with notes. A bit of underlined text pulls his eyes to a passage. “It's a chance in a thousand we've met _,_ ” Sirius reads. 

“No!” Remus’s eyes go wide, and he jumps off the bed, reaching for the book. “Stop, Sirius, please.” 

Sirius holds the book out and sidesteps Remus. He puts on a great oratorical voice once he realizes the tone—Remus has been reading a romance novel. “ _We'll never have the chance again_ —” 

A trunk moves out in front of him, too quickly for him to change his path and avoid it, and Sirius falls to the ground. There’s an assortment of enough stray clothes and blankets where he falls so that it doesn’t hurt, and he’s sure Remus had taken that into consideration when magicking the trunk to make him trip. So sweet.

Luckily, Sirius still has a grip on the book. He crawls a few feet, holding the book out in front of his face, picking up reading from where he left off. “ _We’ll never have the chance again and you know it!_ ” 

Remus jumps atop him and Sirius wriggles to turn over onto his back and give himself a chance at fighting Remus off. 

Sirius holds the book in his left hand and uses his right to swat at Remus’s attempts to grab it back.

“Sirius, really, stop please.” Remus pleads, and the seriousness of his tone catches Sirius off guard a bit. Remus grabs his right arm and pins it on the ground above his head.

He manages to get one more sentence out, “ _stay with me, we love each other,_ " before he realizes that Remus has gone still, stopped trying to grab the book from him. Without any resistance from Remus it’s not as fun—he sets the book down on his chest and glances up at Remus, who isn’t looking at him anymore. He follows Remus’s gaze and finds James standing in the doorway, adorned with a sly grin.

“Was going to see if you fancied another round of soccer,” James said, obviously lying. “But it looks like you’ve gotten your exercise in for the day!” 

Remus lets go of Sirius’s wrist and springs back from him. 

“Uh…” Remus mutters. 

“Um…” Sirius adds. Very Succinct.

Remus reaches down and snags the book off of Sirius.

“I’ve, um,” Remus says. “Got to...go.” And with that, he’s out the door and it’s just him and James alone in the room. 

Reading that final line felt… different, somehow. Than the others. What with being straddled by Remus, their groins in the same approximate area. Sirius is sure it would feel that way with anyone atop him like that though, probably. Definitely. 

He repeats the words aloud to himself again. “We love each other.” Something about it felt… right? He glances up to James, who’s wandered over to him with an exasperated look on his face. “What?” Sirius asks, a bit indignant.

“Nothing,” James sighs. “I suppose you’ll figure it out soon enough.” 

The raw, masculine aggression from the wrestling with Remus returns, and Sirius wants to tap back into it. Needs to. He swipes at James’s ankles and the sudden motion catches him off guard. 

Sirius takes advantage of the hesitation and flips James onto his back, straddling him the way Remus had straddled him just moments before.

Sirius pins down James's wrists above his head and stares at him. He glances between James's lips and his eyes a few times, recreating the experience he just had with Remus, and that's when he realizes. 

"I have a crush on Remus," Sirius blurts out.

"No shit, Sirius," James responds, a hint of a laugh coloring his words. "But what is it about being on top of _me—_ " James points back and forth between them "—that made you realize it?" 

“Because…” Sirius pauses, rolling off to sit on the floor next to James. “That didn’t feel the same as, uh… ”

“When I interrupted you and Remus—”

“When you interrupted me and Remus, yes,” Sirius says, talking over James. “I just, kind of assumed it was…I don’t know, teenage hormones or something.” Sirius laughs at himself, putting his face in his hands. “I should’ve fucking known!” 

“I mean...” 

“James.” He stops him, voice more stern than before. “What am I going to do?” He tries to keep up the seriousness but it wavers into a whine without his permission. 

James just smiles. 

\--

It’s late when Remus finally returns to their dorm, far past curfew. And Friday night curfew is _late._ Sirius has half a mind to march over to him and demand to know where he’s been all evening. He would have, before. Before...well, _before_. He’d have done it jokingly, of course, but also a little bit serious, worried for Remus. 

But as it is, now, the precarious state of their friendship and his uncertainty of how Remus would react is enough to keep him snugly wrapped in his own blankets. 

He rolls over to face the wall, to avoid the temptation of looking at Remus as he readies himself for bed. The sounds of Remus rummaging through his drawers for pajamas fill the room, followed by Remus’s footsteps toward the bathroom. 

Sirius lets himself drift for a while. A sniffle catches his attention, draws him out of the stage between sleep and wakefulness. He holds his breath and strains to listen, trying to tell which bed the noise came from. Peter’s getting over a cold, but it didn’t sound like his snotty noises. Two more shaky breaths confirm his suspicions—It’s Remus. Crying.

A long moment passes as Sirius considers his options. He hasn’t visited Frank to buy any _herbal supplements_ from his “small business” in a while, so he doesn’t have anything with which to lure Remus to the astronomy tower, to distract him from whatever’s going on. Remus probably doesn’t want to talk, and definitely won’t want to talk with Sirius. There’s no reason to get up and check on Remus.

Only...the noises continue. It’s clear Remus is trying to keep silent—probably even tried to cast a silencing charm, but it’s to no avail; Sirius’s enhanced canine hearing allows him to tune in when others aren’t able to. 

Sirius debates. Get up? Check on Remus? Try to talk about earlier? Maybe he’s upset because of the book situation. Definitely the book situation. Well, that settles it. Sirius can’t in good conscience let his friend, let _Remus_ sit there in tears over something so trivial. Sirius doesn’t care that Remus was reading a romance novel! It’s sweet. How can he show that he’s earnest, that he doesn’t care? 

And, oh. An idea pops into existence and before he can contemplate or plan, he’s thrown the blankets off of himself and has both feet on the ground. Brave face time, Sirius. Let’s go ask to borrow the book when Remus is done. Show interest in something important to Remus. Respectfully. Yeah! Let’s do it!

He crosses the room in three bounds, and before he’s given any thought of what exactly to say, he finds himself standing at Remus’s bed. Despite the lack of planning, he starts to speak. 

“Re—” he shifts into Padfoot mid-word, panicking, and the name comes out as a small choked off woof instead. The sound must catch Remus’s attention, because there’s a rustling behind the curtain for a few moments before it pulls open a few inches. 

Remus’s eyes are red-rimmed, swollen, and despite an obvious attempt to wipe them away, tears decorate his eyelashes. This is probably for the best, then, not to be human, not to be able to acknowledge aloud that which Remus wants to ignore. 

They’re at a stalemate, eyes holding each other’s attention as time passes around them. 

“Well, c’mon up then,” Remus says, his voice gruff. He pulls the curtain further open and leans his head out, darting his eyes around the room to see if the other boys are awake. 

Sirius hops up onto the foot of the bed gingerly, or, well, as gingerly as he can. 

He’s got his front paws on the bed, but didn’t give himself enough height, and now he’s scrambling for something to grab onto with his back paws, to boost him up to the bed. There’s nothing there, and Sirius is about to let go, fall back to the ground, but a tug under his armpits hauls him upward.

Sirius settles himself at the foot of the bed, circling in the space like he’s seen other dogs and cats and animals do at the zoo, before they sleep. But before he’s got the chance to lay down, Remus drags him up to his pillow. Which is, frankly, unexpected. Though, it’s not as unexpected as Remus throwing his arms around Sirius’s stomach and pressing his face into Sirius’s fur, which he does promptly after shutting the curtains around the bed. 

“I missed you,” Remus whispers into his fur. “I missed this.” His voice wavers, and Sirius can feel tears gathering again. Remus must think he’s speaking quietly enough not to be heard. He wouldn’t be so open with his feelings otherwise. Sirius nestles into Remus, adjusts slightly to be a better pillow for him. 

Remus strokes down Padfoot’s back, and Sirius lets himself fall away into the feeling. There’s a light scratch on his head, a loose tug on his ears; it all feels luxurious as he flutters in and out of consciousness.

“Sirius, you big dumb dog,” he hears Remus say, later, after they’ve finally settled. His voice is barely audible, but it rouses Sirius just enough from his state of just barely asleep. “I love you.” 

\--

The scratch of fingernails in Sirius’s hair wakes him in the morning. There’s a stream of sunlight coming in through the windows, so he rolls his face into the mattress, determined to remain asleep as long as possible. 

Sirius has got to pee, but he’s also determined to stay _right. Here._ The bedding smells different, and he knows he’s not in his own. Though the fingernails in his hair— _Remus’s_ —fingernails in his hair, really should’ve clued him in first. 

He’s shifted back into regular, normal human Sirius overnight, and though he doesn’t remember waking for it he must have. And regular, normal human Sirius is having a very regular, _normal human_ reaction to the way his hair is being _pulled_ —“Fuck!” 

A laugh catches his attention above him. “G’morning, Sirius,” Remus says, voice barely above a whisper. 

Remus is lounging, propped on his side by his left elbow and the throne of pillows at the head of the bed. He’s almost towering around Sirius, but in a comforting way, not a threatening one. And most notably, of course, his right hand is on Sirius’s head. He’s stopped scratching Sirius’s scalp for the moment but his fingers are still tangled in his curly hair. 

They lock eyes, and Sirius expects Remus to shy away, to pull his hand back. But he doesn’t. There are no distractions for either of them to pretend they’re focusing on. Just each other, and each other's eyes.

Remus raises an eyebrow, a silent question. _Can I continue?_ Sirius lets out a happy sigh and nestles into Remus’s chest, happy to be able to do so as his human self, not his dog self. 

Remus moves his hand to the base of Sirius’s scalp and knots his fingers in the curls there. They re-adjust their positioning slightly on the bed, and Remus squeezes him for a moment, face pressed against the top of his head. 

There’s a gentle tug as Remus begins to card his fingers through Sirius’s hair, more deliberate now. He feels Remus comb through tangles, his nails scraping gently along his hairline, soothed what he assumes is Remus’s thumb trailing behind. 

How did he not know this was such a thing for him? 

Growing up, Sirius’s parents never touched him with anything other than disdain. Even the rare pat on the shoulder he received from family members was menacing, threatening. A memory surfaces of the last person who touched his hair like this—his governess, Charlene. She was an old witch his parents paid to tutor him before his Hogwarts days. 

Charlene was affectionate from her first day. She always snuck in treats for Sirius, showered him with hugs and friendly pats on the head. She’s the only adult who’s ever said I love you to him. 

Once, when Sirius fell in a burr plant in the garden, Charlene spent the afternoon combing out the spikes in his unruly hair. It was long, scraggly, hadn’t been brushed in ages, never mind all of the nettles. After getting it smoothed out, she plaited it into two braids down each side of his head. After Charlene left and Orion saw his hair, he was forced into having his hair buzzed down to his scalp. 

He shakes the memory off as best he can, re-focuses on the here and now, on Remus’s fingers carding through, and his warm body and private bed and the fact that he can grow his hair out again, he’s safe to do what he wants now, that he doesn’t owe the Blacks anything. 

Sirius assumes he must’ve drifted off, because the next thing he knows, Remus is tugging his hair in an almost hypnotic, rhythmic way. He brings his hand up to his head and feels plaits that start at his forehead and move toward the nape of his neck. They’re tight, but not so tight that it hurts. It feels secure. Safe. Comfortable. How odd that he had thought of Charlene and here he is now, hair braided.

“Moons, where did you learn to do this?” 

“I, well, uh,” Remus’s hands still in his hair. “You’ll laugh.”

“I cannot stress how much I will _not_ laugh at how you learned such a godlike skill.”

“I—Well, Tim? Taught me? He’s got long hair like yours.” Remus says the name like he’s afraid of Sirius’s reaction to it.

Sirius grunts in acknowledgement. Remus’s instinct is right—Sirius’s good mood is immediately threatened with the mention of this Tim character. “So you two spent a lot of time together?” 

“Uh, I suppose…” Remus trails off, and as he does his hands start plaiting again. 

“Remus?” 

“Mhm?” His voice is a few pitches too high, and it’s obvious he’s pretending nothing is going on.

“Why…” Sirius pauses, not knowing how to proceed. Is there even a way to ask this without asking Remus what he really wants to ask? Does he even know what he really wants to ask? “Uh, why did the others know, um, well, know about Tim before me?” He shuts his mouth before he lets the rest of the anxieties out, the ones about being replaced. 

James had reassured him this conversation would go well. There’s a simple reason, James had said. Sirius can’t help but hope that maybe Remus returns his feelings. He just needs to get this _Tim_ out of the picture first. 

“Oh—” Remus sounds surprised. “Sirius, you really don’t know? I thought I had been…well, sort of obvious.” 

“What?” Sirius moves to sit up next to him in bed, but Remus stills him with his hands before he gets too far. 

“Let me tie this off so your hair stays,” Remus says. He conjurs a ponytail holder and wraps it tightly around the frayed ends of the braid. When Remus takes his hands away, Sirius finally moves to sit. 

“Remus, who is Tim?” It takes everything in him to not use the past tense, though he sincerely hopes that Tim doesn’t exist to Remus in the present. 

“We sort of…dated? This summer?” Remus looks down at his hand fisted in the bedsheets like it’s the most interesting thing on this side of the equator. 

“...And?” Sirius prompts.

“I told the others because it just…seemed easier? Well, I told James. Who knows if Peter figured it out.” They both laugh, but Remus quickly returns to the topic at hand. “Every time I tried to write you, it felt wrong. I didn’t want you to think…” He trails off.

“Think what?” 

“To think that I really liked Tim, that it was serious.” 

“It wasn’t?” Sirius’s voice pitches up into falsetto territory.

Remus smiles a one-sided grin. “It was all a bit of fun, Sirius. Like. Like a trial run,” Remus seems to gain confidence in what he’s saying. “I enjoyed myself, don’t get me wrong.” 

Sirius can’t help but waggle his eyebrows at Remus, to tease him for what sounds like him maybe getting frisky with Tim, even if the knowledge that Remus was with someone—someone _else_ —sits heavy and uncomfortable in his gut. 

“That’s cool, Remus. Thank you for telling me.” Sirius tries to match the smile that appears on Remus’s face, but he knows his own doesn’t reach his eyes. “It must have been nice to find someone you really liked.” 

“Sirius, are you listening to me?” Remus is still smiling. “It’s not that I didn’t care for him, I did, I _do,_ but I’m not going to see him again. He was a fling. Like I said. A trial run. For the real thing.” 

Great, so Remus just wanted to get a bunch of experience with someone so he could come back to Hogwarts and seduce some other boy. Sirius wonders who it is, who caught Remus’s attention. Probably a Hufflepuff. 

“Cool!” Sirius says, though it takes a lot to try to say it with anything approaching a normal voice. “I’m glad you found someone you really truly like.” He swallows a dry gulp. “How’s it going? The seduction?” 

“Mmm, I’d say it’s going pretty well.” Remus lifts a hand to Sirius’s hair again, tugs on a loose curl by his ear. “I like waking up next to him.” 

“Wait,” Sirius starts to speak but all words escape him. Things are slotting together in his head, things he didn’t want to let himself hope for. He points to himself instead. 

“Yes, dummy.” Remus leans in, slow enough that Sirius could lean away if he wanted to, not that he wants to, because this is every dream come true. But he doesn’t go lips first, like Sirius was expecting. He presses their foreheads together, brings his other hand up to the other side of Sirius’s head, gently cupping his jaw. Their eyes meet, and it’s comfortable. It’s safe.

There’s that raised eyebrow again, asking for permission. 

Sirius tips his chin up essentially rocking his face over Remus’s so they’re connected at the mouth instead of the forehead. 

Remus lets out a quick breath, clearly amused by Sirius’s clumsiness. 

Then their lips meet again and it’s much better this time. More coordinated. Remus is soft in a way unlike anyone else Sirius has ever kissed, and hard in other ways. A juxtaposition of curves and straight lines, boney elbows and knees and soft tummy and squeezable arse—which his hand has drifted dangerously close to. 

Remus pulls away and pushes Sirius down onto the bed on his back, a position he takes very enthusiastically. Remus swings a leg over him and it’s just like the other day, the day he had realized what these feelings meant. 

Remus smiles at him, like he knows he’s about to rock Sirius’s world and he is extremely smug about it. 

Hips press together and grind and oh—

Remus takes one of his hands and places Sirius’s hand on his bum, the same cheek he had scooped during soccer. Here he is with _permission to squeeze_ if the insistent pressing Remus is doing to his wrist means anything. 

They break apart for just a moment. 

“Sirius,” Remus pants. “C’mon, please, just—” 

Remus doesn’t seem to have the words for what he’s asking, but Sirius can guess. He grabs tighter with his hand, and brings the other to the other cheek, using them both to piston their hips together. 

When they get out of bed, after, when they’re both clean and have caught their breath and have exchanged more kisses and gropes and swats, the rest of the room is empty. Thank _god._ Sirius didn’t even think to check, though Remus probably had. He’s smart like that. 

They dress and Remus leads them down the stairs to the common room. It’s late Saturday morning so everyone is out spending their free time elsewhere, maybe still at the continental brunch. Everyone except Peter and James, who have repositioned a couch to face the bottom of their staircase. Well, James probably did the rearranging. 

“Congratulations, boys,” James calls out to them, before they’re even at the bottom of the stairs. “How was it?” 

Not one to back down from a challenge, Sirius responds: “Excellent; Moony’s got talented fingers!”

There’s sputtering noises from all around him, and Remus is immediately talking over them. “I was just giving him a head massage! And then I did this,” he gestures to Sirius’s braided hair. 

“Head? Nice!” James lifts a hand toward Sirius for a high five, but Remus slaps it out of the way before they get a chance. 

“Quit being vulgar, arsehole.” Remus’s face is fully blushed, but he’s got a smile plastered to his mouth.

“Food time? Please?” Peter chimes in. “James has made us wait here for hours for the two of you. What were you even doing up there anyway?” 

Remus and Sirius meet each other's gaze for a moment, before Remus lets out a chuckle and continues walking toward the common room exit. Sirius follows closely behind, close enough to have their hands brush while they walk. 

“We’ll tell you when you’re older, Pete.” James says, and then they’re all off.

**Author's Note:**

> I would be nothing and nowhere without my writing partner lads: [Camille](https://archiveofourown.org/users/boxofpigeons/pseuds/boxofpigeons) and [June](https://archiveofourown.org/users/JoonGloom). Keep your eyes peeled for some amazing long-ass Remus/Sirius fics that were in gestation with this one from both of them soon. Go subscribe to them both now!


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